If you’ve ever used RetailMeNot to find a promo code or coupon, you may be wondering: Where do we get intel about all those discounts on our more than 70,000 store pages? How do we verify that they work? 

To be fully transparent, we’ve assembled a guide on how we source our deals, as well as all the checks and balances they go through, which we’ve been honing since RetailMeNot came on the shopping scene back in 2006.

Introduction to Our Verification Process

RetailMeNot sources codes directly from our network of affiliate partners, but also hand-sources promo codes, coupons and sales via our Merchandising team (which creates between 60K and 90K offers in any given month, by the way). That team has a combined 45+ years of experience sourcing deals (with the longest-standing member of the team having been with us for 12 years and counting). 

That team verifies codes manually to ensure those codes are valid and usable for real shoppers at checkout. We also take into account the fine print (expiration dates, restrictions and any excluded categories) when evaluating a promo code or deal to make sure that shoppers are getting fresh, trustworthy shopping info that’s been tested and verified on a consistent basis.

You can see all the fine print by hitting “Details” when viewing a deal:

How and Where We Source Coupons

One the primary ways we source verified coupon codes and offers is through our direct partnerships with top retailers. These offers include a retailer’s everyday deals and seasonal sales, as well as exclusive offers for our users. On top of the deals that come directly from our merchant partners, our Merchandising team scours the internet for even more promo codes and deals to make sure you’re receiving the best price, wherever you shop. And we’re not just adding every code we find, either – we verify that each code and deal is valid before we add it to our site, so you don’t waste your time at checkout.  

User-Submitted Coupons

At RetailMeNot, we have yet another source of offers – you, the user! Our users can submit offers to us that they find via our forms, to help other shoppers save. Our form asks users to include all relevant information (online codes, in-store barcodes, sale end date, etc.). Submitted deals then go into our moderation queue, where our dedicated moderation team will review each offer. In 2022, we had more than a thousand users submitting offers per month.

Expiration Dates and Terms

Our team keeps track of expiration dates, as well as terms and conditions for each offer. That means a dedicated team of deal experts is always working diligently to maintain accurate and up-to-date information across thousands of retailers. We make sure expired or invalid codes are removed, so that our users can trust the deals they see on our site.

Transparency and Disclosures

We have strong partnerships with a vast network of retailers. This enables us to offer exclusive deals and cash back offers that you won’t find elsewhere. Our teams work directly with those retail partners to make sure our users get the best possible (and up-to-date) discounts and offers.

Deal Updates Process

Our verification process is constantly running in the background so that you can take our offers shopping. Our team is working around the clock (even on weekends). We have so many fresh, new deals coming in from all our sources, that we are constantly verifying them to make sure we have only accurate deals live on our site – and that we consistently provide the best experience for shoppers like you.

Our Blog Team

Here on the blog, we rely on the intel from our Merchandising team for our editorial coverage (to the tune of more than 1,200 articles published in the past year about deals, major shopping events and industry news). 

Our small but mighty blog team has a combined 13 years of deal-hunting experience. That’s a dozen Black Fridays spent in the deals trenches (in fact, two members of our team served on our sister site BlackFriday.com’s editorial team for several years). We know Labor Day, Memorial Day, Prime Day, Cyber Monday, all the semiannual sales inside out and eagerly dissect whatever sales retailers throw at us along the way.

And our team’s shopping industry expertise has been recognized: In 2023, we won an APEX Award of Excellence in the Feature Writing category forhow to shop sustainably (and affordably) for fashion and an AVA Digital Awards Gold Award in the Content Marketing (Blog-Single Post) category for our deep dive into the buy now, pay later industry.

RAKUTEN

How do we make money?

Our business is based on a simple idea: When you follow our links to visit a store, that store pays us a commission on whatever you buy during your visit. We then share that commission with you, our members, as Cash Back.

In other words, retailers pay to partner with us because we send shoppers to their websites or brick-and-mortar stores. They may also pay us to help grow their brand. That means we might feature them on our website, in emails, etc. Because of these partnerships, members like you benefit by earning Cash Back and getting great offers.

To sum it up, we help retailers succeed and, at the same time, help our members save money.

What does it mean when Rakuten states that a Cash Back percentage "was" a certain amount?

Stores pay us a commission for sending our members to their websites, and we share it with you as cash back. When a store joins Rakuten, we set a cash back percentage for that store (a "base cash back percentage"). We work with our merchant partners to offer increased cash back from time to time to our members. An increased cash back percentage is often promoted alongside a "was %". The "was %" describes the "base cash back percentage," but does not necessarily or always reflect the most recent cash back percentage or the most common cash back percentage for a store. The cash back percentage for any store is not a fixed percentage and is subject to change.